MediSafe expands medication management platform to include wearables

HAIFA, ISRAEL — At Google’s I/O Developer Conference last month, MediSafe expanded its medication management platform to include wearables, becoming the first mobile health app on Google’s just-announced suite of Android Wear smartwatches, the company announced Tuesday.

Users wearing either the LG Android Wear, Samsung Gear Live or Moto 360 smartwatches, who also have the MediSafe medication management solution installed on their Android smartphone or tablet, will automatically have a MediSafe “wearable app” loaded on their Android Wear and begin receiving medication reminders on their smartwatch when it’s time to take scheduled doses.

Users have a choice to record taking doses two different ways: “Shake to Take” — where users simply rotate their wrists left-to-right; or "Swipe and Tap" — where users swipe-left on their reminder and tap once to confirm.

In either scenario, the data is seamlessly transferred to the MediSafe app on the user's smartphones and tablets via Bluetooth, where it becomes part of their full medication adherence file that they can export and email securely to their personal healthcare providers in between office visits.

“Android Wear brings MediSafe one step closer to patients — something central to our mission of connecting patients and healthcare providers for constant, two-way communication around medication management,” stated MediSafe CEO Bob Shor. “We’re thrilled to be the first wearable medication management solution, and very grateful to Google for the opportunity to expand our platform to Android Wear, allowing us to further improve patients’ health outcomes.”

MediSafe also welcomes partnerships with sensor-based wearables, which would allow it to incorporate vital health statistics, like users’ blood-glucose levels, steps taken per day and sleep patterns, with its own data for when users took their medications, plus users’ reported feelings — to give physicians a more complete picture of patients’ lives. With this data all in one place, physicians gain the ability to make more informed decisions about patients.

Today’s Android Wear integration broadens MediSafe’s existing platform, which includes branded versions for hospitals, electronic medical/health records systems and HMOs that send patients medication reminders via the web or SMS — in addition to its flagship mobile app, which was first to sync medication reminders among families’ and caregivers’ mobile devices.

MediSafe has been downloaded for free in Google Play and the iTunes App Store more than 700,000 times, reminded users to take more than 35 million doses, and been viewed by users more than 60 million times, the company noted. Its users have an average medication adherence rate of 86%, compared with the 50% average adherence figure for the general population cited by both the World Health Organization and the Centers for Disease Control.

The investigational pain medication was formulated to incorporate abuse-deterrent properties designed to make the product more difficult to manipulate for the purpose of misuse or abuse by various routes of administration (e.g., chewing, snorting and intravenous injection).

"This is another milestone in our effort to offer patients and health professionals a portfolio of pain medications with abuse-deterrent technology," stated Mark Timney, president and CEO of Purdue Pharma. "I'm proud of Purdue's leadership in advancing this important area of pharmaceutical innovation for the benefit of public health."

"It is imperative to provide healthcare professionals with an array of therapeutic options to ensure chronic pain patients receive individualized care," added Todd Baumgartner, VP regulatory affairs and chief medical officer at Purdue Pharma. "If approved by the FDA, this product will be a valuable therapy for treating chronic pain, and it is also designed to deter misuse and abuse by various routes of administration."

Purdue conducted a series of manipulation and extraction studies and clinical abuse liability studies to evaluate the abuse-deterrent properties of this investigational formulation. The data from these studies were recently presented at the 33rd Annual Scientific Meeting of the American Pain Society.

Hydrocodone combination products are one of the most commonly prescribed opioid analgesics in the United States, the company noted. These products are also the most widely abused (nonmedical use), according to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. Currently available hydrocodone formulations do not incorporate abuse-deterrent technologies, Purdue Pharma stated.

Centor is the new name for Rexam Prescription Products, company announces

PERRYSBURG, Ohio — Rexam Prescription Products on Tuesday is changing its name to Centor, the company announced.

Centor is one of the world’s largest suppliers of regulatory compliant prescription containers for medication dispensing.

"Our name [Centor], evoking primarily the Centaur, the powerful creature of Greek mythology, known for wisdom, healing and honor, also conjures the ideas of center and century, as we have been central to the pharmacy industry for over 100 years," the company stated on its new website, CentorRx.com."Our logo reinforces those ideas. The capital C is a visual translation of the simplicity and strength of our closure systems. The lower case evokes proximity and the orange stands for warmth and health."

Centor will continue to operate in its current organizational structure with customer contacts remaining unchanged. Centor’s business remains unaffected by this transition and customers will not notice any change in the way they do business with Centor moving forward.

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